Jessica G.

Those unfortunate souls who find cutting insufficiently harmful have taken mutilation to the next level with something doctors call "self-embedding disorder." According to the Chicago Tribune, embedding is when people deliberately insert objects into their flesh, either by forcing them through wounds or by puncturing the flesh with those objects.

Personnel at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, report extracting 52 foreign objects that 10 teenage girls deliberately embedded in their arms, hands, feet, ankles and necks over the last three years, including needles, staples, wood, stone, glass, pencil lead and a crayon. One patient had inserted 11 objects, including an unfolded metal paper clip more than 6 inches long.

Good Christ. Although the Trib reports that 13-24% of high school students deliberately injure themselves at least once, they do emphasize that embedding is an incredibly extreme version of this behavior and that "All the cases in the Ohio study involved girls living in foster homes, group homes or mental health facilities. Many had experienced or witnessed physical or sexual abuse, and most had been diagnosed with depression, anxiety or other mental health problems." Even so: we will not be able to look at a paper clip the same way again.